Long on potential, short on production, to my mind there is no stronger illustration of everything that was wrong with the Marlins 2012 season than Logan Morrison. He spends more time on Twitter than he does analyzing his approach to the plate and refining his game. I even caught a tweet of his during a game once – and I am sure it has happened more than that.
Let’s get something clear – I am not saying I do not like the guy. This kid came out of nowhere and became a big prospect for the Marlins as a first baseman that could just work the count and hit the ball wherever, and whenever, he wanted. Then he had some personal tragedy with the death of his father: obviously a large part of his life Morrison is now faced with living in a world without someone who had such a large influence on him. Who wouldn’t be rooting for him?
And let’s not forget that his two knee surgeries are the result of horrible handling by the Marlins. Morrison should never have been rushed to play last season and as a result, he was running around in LF in pain on nightly defensive adventures and had to get surgery in September to alleviate damage and pain in his right knee. His offense was never there, nor was his defense, and he missed most of the 2nd half of the season while only playing in 93 games. We love his antics but would love it more if he was a productive player first.
Now, he is not going to be at full strength and ready to run as Spring Training is descending upon us all. This is a decision that the Marlins made last season that they are now paying for this season. Perhaps it was all of the hype and excitement over a new ballpark and new players and all of the electricity. For whatever reason, the hangover is now that the Marlins are faced with one of their brightest prospects now at risk of becoming a wash as he has yet to put together a productive season.
So the Fish have to patch together some ideas for 1B and also find a way to bridge the offense until Morrison comes back – and when he does, it will take some time for him to get acclimated with playing everyday at 1B. That is why Joe Mahoney and Casey Kotchman were brought in, and Austin Kearns and Greg Dobbs are expected to be mixed in there from time to time.
With Morrison out, perhaps longer than he ever should have been as the result of poor choices, there is no better illustration of what went wrong with the Marlins. His production suffered and he never lived up to his billing last season. The wins didn’t come, and the team utterly and disasterly failed. And Lomo, for all of his lovable tweets and antics, has to now focus on delivering on the field instead of growing his “brand” via Twitter and other social networks. He has to get back to work, repair the damage, and find a way to deliver on a once promising future.
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